Ruby Nava waters plants and flowers in the "Texas Skywalk & Habitats" section of the new Rory Meyers Children's Adventure Garden at the Dallas Arboretum. The eight-acre garden is set to open this fall.

The children’s garden at the Dallas Arboretum is shaping up to be not just a botanical exhibit, but a science museum without walls.

It’s definitely intended to attract more than just children.

“We believe in the Sesame Street philosophy — that when you have something aimed at kids, you have to have material in there that appeals to adults,” said Maria Conroy, the Arboretum’s vice president of education. “You want to bring them to the same table where their children are learning.”

Although the Rory Meyers Children’s Adventure Garden is about 95 percent complete, the 8-acre facility won’t be open to the public until Sept. 21. Arboretum officials, who pushed back the opening because of construction delays, are using the time to fine-tune the final product by admitting test groups of children and adults.

After two years of construction, the final cost of the garden is expected to be $61 million, about $5 million more than original estimates. Much of the difference has been from parking construction.

In any case, the goal of the project has not been modest.

“We intend to set the gold standard for children’s gardens across the world,” arboretum president and CEO Mary Brinegar said at the start of a sneak-peak tour this week.

‘Wow’ factor

The finished project aims to administer science education with high doses of “wow.”

Its 150 interactive exhibits include mazes, kaleidoscopes, water cannons, artificial caves, LED lighting, sundials, elevated walkways and waterfalls — many of which teach ideas such as mathematics and aerodynamics that most people don’t associate with the plant world.

Among the most arresting exhibits is the OmniGlobe, a five-foot lighted digital sphere created by ARC Science Simulations, based in Loveland, Colo. A touch screen converts the sphere into high-tech models of moons and planets, especially Earth.

The OmniGlobe’s 50 programs can dramatically demonstrate continental drift, population density, deforestation, ocean currents, tsunamis and earthquakes. A developing hurricane can be tracked on the sphere in real time.

After seeing a demonstration of the Arboretum’s OmniGlobe, a visiting official from National Geographic vowed to obtain one for the organization’s lobby, Conroy said.

In an attempt to supplement classroom education in the region, some of the exhibits function as science laboratories — far more sophisticated ones than those in even the most affluent school districts.

Children will be able to use scientific tools to study the properties of soil and plants, even extract DNA from strawberries.

‘This is so cool’

Much of the learning is presented in a way to entice children. An exhibit on power demonstrates how to energize an incandescent light using water power; the height of a fountain is governed by positioning a solar panel.

“We’re trying to appeal to a 9- or 10-year-old boy who thinks he’s seen it all, and we’re trying to get him to say, ‘This is so cool,’” Conroy said.

Arboretum officials said they have been monitoring the experience of the Perot Museum of Nature and Science, which has attracted huge crowds since it opened last December.

In anticipation of loving overuse, for example, officials have ordered duplicates of breakable custom-made objects in the garden’s exhibits.

While admission policies won’t be finalized until later this summer, officials have decided to require that patrons reserve a time for their visit, much as the Perot has.

Arboretum officials have set an optimum capacity of 1,500 people in the garden at any one time. Test groups this summer are being monitored for the time they spend in the garden, so officials can better control the flow of crowds.

Some of the preparation has necessarily boiled down to guesswork.

“Sometimes we don’t know exactly what we’re doing. But no one has ever done this before,” Brinegar said.

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